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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22509589">Rise Again</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sigridhr/pseuds/Sigridhr'>Sigridhr</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Captain Marvel (2019), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/F, Femslash February, House sharing, Pining, Post-Endgame, Slow Burn, coming out narrative, costal landscapes, just some fishermen ladies falling in love, too many lobsters</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 08:54:16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>9,023</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22509589</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sigridhr/pseuds/Sigridhr</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>After the snap, Darcy moves to New Asgard to try and create a new life for herself. The life she gets isn't the one she expects.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Carol Danvers/Darcy Lewis</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>110</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>63</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Begin</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>For Femslash February 2020. Each chapter will be a multiple of 100 words, but not consistent. Based on the prompt list <a href="https://sigridhr.tumblr.com/post/190519322525/femslash-february-2020-prompts-for-darcyland-help">here</a>. </p><p>Prompt: <b>Begin</b><br/>400 words.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Even though she doesn’t remember it, fitting back into life after the snap seems impossible to Darcy. The world as it stands now is full of stark reminders that years have passed by without her. Her apartment is gone and her stuff mostly sold on, save what Jane had managed to salvage for her (her battered computer, thank goodness), and, while the city is doing everything it can to get snap victims rehoused, it’s hard not to feel a little bit like a dead girl walking. </p>
<p>So, she takes up the chance to move to New Asgard when it’s offered to her by Thor without thinking too hard. It’s Brunnhilde who’s truly in charge, and Darcy likes her immediately. She grins widely, openly and tells Darcy they don’t really have room for shirkers here and she’s going to have to get used to fishing. Having a purpose, even if it is fishing, sounds better than the sort of nothing Darcy’s been living in, so she smiles back and says she’ll take it. </p>
<p>After a drink, Brunnhilde shows her into a small stone cottage, with a view out over the open ocean and the smell of sea spray all around. There are two bedrooms, and Brunnhilde says that the other occupant is rarely home so it’ll be like having the place to herself.  She sees few signs of occupation, and true to her word, Darcy is alone for the first two weeks. The kitchen is simple with an aga of all things, that is blissfully warm to stand in front of with a cup of tea and peer out into the grey. The house also comes with a kitten; an over-fluffed little orange thing, which trots along happily after her everywhere she goes and bats at the crab claws she pulls out of the water. The kitten is perversely named ‘Gosling’, and Brunnhilde simply smiles and says she’ll have to ask her roommate when she asks why. But the way he follows her around always at her heels she finds the name oddly appropriate. </p>
<p>She’s nearly asleep when a streak of light flies past her window like a shooting star. Her heart thumps wildly as she sits up in bed, peering out the window. The night is dark, but she hears the door open.  </p>
<p>Darcy knows who she is even before she holds her hand out and says, “hi. I’m Carol.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Winter</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>200 words.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s cold down to her bones. The salt spray of the sea seems to be cutting straight through her every time it hits, and her fingers have gone completely numb as she fumbles at the catches of the lobster cages. The Asgardians around her are singing a surprisingly cheerful song given the inclement weather. Gosling is curled up in her jacket, purring away happily against her chest, his ears flicking each time they caught a bit of the ocean spray. </p><p>Carol sits beside her, dangling her legs over the edge of the pier, looking out over the water. </p><p>“Lobsters?” she asks, and teasingly prods one, laughing when it tries to snap at her. “It’s a good haul.” </p><p>Darcy’s fingers fumble on the catch again and Carol’s hands brush hers aside and deftly lift the cage out of her grasp and manage the catch. Carol’s hands are hot to the point of painful against Darcy’s chilled skin, and, although they only touched for barely a second, she flexes her fingers reflexively in response. Carol seems oblivious, re-baiting the trap and setting it aside with the others. </p><p>But for a moment, Darcy feels like the sun has broken through the relentless grey.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Morning</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>300 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s a perfectly quiet morning when Darcy wakes up. The grass is covered in a veil of frost and she can see the first rays of the sun just beginning to hit the ground, setting the world aglow. Her breath fogs on the windowpane and she rests her arms on the sill and Gosling gives a small shiver and curls up into a tiny ball in her lap. It’s beautiful and peaceful, though she knows in a couple hours New Asgard will be bustling with activity and she’ll have work to do. For now, she’s happy, blearily pressing her forehead against the cool window pane and stroking Gosling’s fur absentmindedly. </p><p>Carol comes striding across the grass, her tall boots leaving a path of dark green footprints on the lawn. She’s leading a collection of sheep who are all huddled together against the early morning cold, ‘baah’-ing blearily at each other. Carol runs her hand across the nose of one, looking contemplative before shutting them in their paddock and leaning against the gate. </p><p>Darcy is struck by the way the morning sun has silhouetted Carol’s form. Her golden hair glows like warm amber, and Darcy feels oddly fixated by the shape of her arms, the length of her fingers as her hands rest lazily against the fence. Carol has beautiful hands, which seem to rest with an effortless elegance like a grecian statue’s and Darcy wants to catch them in her own. To interleave her fingers with Carol’s just to see what it feels like. She’s warm suddenly, shifting to get more of the cool press of glass against her cheek. </p><p>Carol turns, and at once Darcy realises she’s staring and flops down back into bed. Gosling meows in annoyance, but her heart is beating too frantically to really hear him.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Quiet</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>300 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She’s comfortably settled in, most of the way through her book and just getting to the good bit when she realises the noises from the kitchen have stopped. Suddenly she finds it impossible to focus on the words on the page, and she stares blankly at the open book listening to the relentless thud of her own heartbeat in her ears. </p><p>She nearly jumps out of her skin when there’s a knock at the door. </p><p>“Do you want some tea?” Carol asks, poking her head in. </p><p>Darcy shuts down a thousand strangled and awkward thoughts that she very much does not want to have and tries to think of anything but the weird morning where she stared at Carol’s hands and somehow wound up fixated. She tries very hard to think about anything else. Sure, she’d stared at Thor a couple times. And at Cap’s ass a time or two. And really, how different was it to just take an insane fancy to your housemate’s hands? Her gaze flickers to Carol’s fingers on the doorknob, the way her wrist seems perfectly thin (which is a weird thing in itself to think).</p><p>Carol’s gives her a teasing, if somewhat bemused, smile. “You alright?”</p><p>“Tea’s good,” says Darcy at last. She tries to stop the blush rising in her cheeks and busies herself finding a warm pair of socks. “I’ll come join you.” </p><p>“Sure,” Carol says, padding back to the kitchen. </p><p>Her heart is beating frantically quickly for reasons she can’t – and doesn’t want to – articulate. She thinks of the moment she watched Carol in the early morning light, and wants to just curl up back in bed with her stupid thoughts and her stupid book…</p><p>“Is mint OK?”</p><p>She’s faced alien invasions but she’s not sure she’ll survive tea.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Alone</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>500 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Darcy has 22 tabs open on her laptop of various celebrity crushes. She has pulled up a load of gifsets of back-in-his-glory-days Harrison Ford, and all the bath scenes from The Witcher. She pores over them with a bizarre ferocity, watching the way their hands move. Watching the planes of their chests. Watching the very, very chiseled abs. </p><p>Nothing. </p><p>They were good looking enough, she supposed. She couldn’t deny they were ripped, and they weren’t unattractive. But they didn’t go half as far into rendering her insanely tongue-tied the way that one moment in the morning had. It’s practically imprinted on her memory and she feels oddly guilty the way it keeps playing over and over in her mind. She watches Henry Cavill’s fingers move slowly along the side of the bath as water streams down his slick chest and feels oddly hollow. They’re too large, almost oppressive. He’s too wide, too angled. </p><p>She sighs and tries again. This time she looks up women, trying to think of the most beautiful ones she can. She googles a lot of Doctor Who gifs and watches Billie Piper stick her tongue out over and over. But it’s not about beautiful women either – and if not that, what? </p><p>She wanders around town. The Aesir are all beautiful, in an odd otherworldly way. They’re mostly human, but not quite. Just that tiny bit too perfect, too tall, eyes too bright. She watches all of them, men and women alike. She watches Brunnhilde’s hands as she sews up nets, watches the hands of the men as they bring in the catch and feels nothing at all like what she feels for Carol. She tries watching Brunnhilde all day, the way her hips sway as she walks, the shape of her silhouette, and of course the way she holds her hands. But she feels nothing. She knows Brunnhilde is (terrifyingly) attractive, but she feels <i>nothing</i>.</p><p>She tries catching that precise angle, that glint of sunlight that will recapture the moment and somehow <i>explain it</i> because she is utterly flustered by its memory and doesn’t really know what to do with this information. She’s never had reason to consider anything but men, who were always just sort of <i>there</i>. And this is nothing like the vague interest in various men she’s had before. But why hands? Surely people who were attracted to women were into boobs of some description? Or asses? Or even faces, at least? </p><p>The idea that she might be a weird fetisisht in the making is growing steadily and uneasily in her mind. There had to be a way to sort all this out that wasn’t insanely weird and didn’t end with her being a pervy hand fancier. </p><p>Brunnhilde gives her an odd look as she slinks back home in the evening, more confused than ever. She googles ‘hands’ and looks at a load of pictures, but then feels extremely silly. </p><p>It’s something unique to Carol alone.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Dreams</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>200 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She’s more than a little surprised to find Carol sitting in the dark kitchen, tea in hand and back to the aga. </p><p>“It’s four am,” she says, filling a glass of water. </p><p>“Couldn’t sleep,” Carol replies. She curls up in her chair, dropping her chin to rest on her knee. “Sorry to wake you.”</p><p>“Bad dreams?” Darcy asks. </p><p>“Something like that.”</p><p>Darcy leans up against the sink. “Do you want to talk about it? I know a thing or two about nightmares.” </p><p>Even in the dark she can feel Carol’s gaze on her, and she tries not to look away. </p><p>“Yeah, I guess you do,” Carol says at last. “You went in the snap?” </p><p>Darcy grimaces. “Yeah. Rude awakening coming back.”</p><p>“I know a thing or two about lost time,” says Carol. She shoves a chair out with her foot from under the table. “Sit if you’re gonna stay. But I won’t begrudge you if you’d rather be sleeping.” </p><p>In truth, Darcy wouldn’t, and she puts a pin in that to contemplate why later. “I thought you survived the snap?” </p><p>Carol’s smile is a little hollow – but Darcy doesn’t know anyone whose isn’t anymore. </p><p>“You heard of the Kree?”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Stars</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>400 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The moment Jane’s voices crackles “hello” down the line Darcy is hit with a flood of just how much she’s <i>missed her</i>. She presses the phone even closer to her ear, wishing more than anything Jane were there in person so she could hug her. She can hear the waves lapping against the rocky shore in the distance, and the world is bathed in silver-grey from the stars above. She looks up at the stars, out of habit, and feels the absence of Jane’s presence like an ache. </p><p>“Hey, Jane,” she says. “Clear skies tonight. Are you taking readings?” </p><p>Jane laughs, and Darcy can hear the clink of her teaspoon in her coffee cup over the line. “No, data collection is finished for the moment. I’m working on writing up the latest findings - there’s some interesting red-shift data that might indicate a bridge…” </p><p>She misses this, being enveloped in Jane’s drive to look farther and deeper beyond their own world. To push with her telescopes and her equipment ever further outwards to distant worlds, and with her datasets reach out and touch them, quantify them, and illuminate them out in the dark. Carol’s been to alien worlds, she knows, but it feels all so impossibly foreign and strange, and <i>safer</i> with Jane who can quantify, explain and <i>answer</i> in a way that makes her feel grounded and at home.</p><p>“I wish you were here,” says Jane.</p><p>“Me too.” Darcy prods the ground with her foot. “But I’m happy here, I think.” </p><p>Jane sighs. “I’m glad, Darcy. I really am.” </p><p>“I have a roommate,” Darcy says, without thinking. She wants more than anything to unload all of the thoughts whirling around in her mind about Carol, but she doesn’t even know where to begin.</p><p>“Oh yes?”</p><p>“Captain Marvel,” she says. “Carol.” </p><p>“Is she a better or worse roommate than I was?” Jane asks teasingly. “She better not be better.”</p><p>“Of course she’s better,” says Darcy, with a laugh. “She doesn’t make me do math.”</p><p>“You <i>offered</i> to do math,” Jane points out. “That’s how we met.”</p><p>“And you abused the privilege.” </p><p>“But seriously, Darcy. Are you alright out there?” She can hear Jane’s tone go soft. “You can always come here with me if you change your mind.” </p><p>“I know,” says Darcy. “But I think I really am going to be happy here.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Still</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>500 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She finds Carol sitting at the kitchen table, utterly still, staring at a photograph held in her hand. Darcy hangs her coat up, making enough noise to be sure Carol’s heard her come in so she doesn’t accidentally sneak up on her. She stomps her feet a little more than she needs taking off her wellies and pads along the hallway, eager to change out of her damp socks. </p><p>“Hey,” Carol calls out. Darcy stops, she’s peeling one sock off, bent over and leaning on the wall for support. Carol is sitting at the table, leaning her arm over the back of the chair to look over at her. Darcy can see the outline of her clavicle starkly, a sharp line below her neck, and she is struck by the sudden impossible urge to run her fingers over it. To press into the small hollow at the base of it. </p><p>“Are you alright?” Carol asks. She isn’t, of course, but she isn’t about to say that either. Carol’s shifted, and so does her clavicle, and Darcy’s heart gives an unpleasant lurch. She realises her foot is still in the air, her sock half-off. </p><p>“Yep. Fine, good, excellent. Sorry, wet socks.”</p><p>Carol is looking at her with a deeply curious expression that sort of makes her want to die. “Well,” she says finally, “when you’re done changing your socks, there’s dinner.” </p><p>It takes Darcy a full 10 minutes of feeling stupid and embarrassed and just very confused before she can summon the strength to go back out there. </p><p>“What’s this?” There’s a shoebox on the table with the lid off, full of papers and photos. Carol reaches past her to pick one up, and Darcy’s mouth goes dry as Carol’s arm brushes her side. </p><p>“Here,” she says, handing a picture of herself with a smiling little girl to Darcy. “My past life.”</p><p>“You have a kid?” </p><p>“Not quite, but close enough. When I was taken by the Kree I lost touch with them. I tried for a long time to go back and make it the way it was, but I’d missed too much and I wasn’t the same anymore.”</p><p>She passes Darcy another photo. “That’s her mom. Maria.” </p><p>Carol’s arm is around Maria’s waist and they’re looking at each other instead of the camera. There’s something so tender about the image that it almost feels intrusive, like she’s spying on a private moment. </p><p>“Is that why you came here? To get away?”</p><p>“Not quite,” says Carol, “I’ve been getting away for a long time, hiding out in space so I don’t have to think about any of this. I came here to see if I could ever come home.”</p><p>Darcy’s throat is bone dry, and she puts the photo down on the table to hide the fact that her hands are shaking a little. </p><p>“And can you?”</p><p>Carol looks at her and smiles softly, and something painful begins to uncurl in Darcy’s chest. </p><p>“Yeah,” she says. “I think I can.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Spring</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>400 words.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Lobster season is coming to an end, which just means switching to fishing in the early morning instead. Darcy finds it peaceful, mending nets and then trawling slowly before returning with the catch. She doesn’t have to do any of the trading, thankfully. New Asgard gets what it can’t provide for itself from the closest city, and she reaps the spoils. There’s something healing to her in doing something so quantifiably productive – after the snap and the odd sense of loss it brought, of time she doesn’t remember, it feels grounding to be pulling straight from the Earth. </p><p>Carol is leaning over the side of the boat, dragging her fingers through the water as they trawl. It’s quiet, the ocean winding up like a spring and waiting for the release of the summer species to come and fill their nets. But it’s unseasonably warm, and for the first time this year Darcy sheds her coat and sits back to look up at the sunny sky. </p><p>“I used to be a pilot,” Carol says. She leans her arm on the side of the boat, propping her head up. “It would be a beautiful day for flying.” </p><p>“You still can,” Darcy replies. “I’ve seen you.” </p><p>Carol stares at her for a moment. “Do you trust me?”</p><p>“To do what?” Darcy asks, as Carol gets to her feet and the boat sways beneath them. “What? No!”</p><p>Carol laughs. “Trust me.” </p><p>Her hand is outstretched you Darcy and all Darcy can hear is the mad rushing of her own frantically beating heart in her ears. She reaches out, touching Carol’s fingers first, then gripping her hand tightly. She can see Carol smile, bright and earnest, as she calls upon her power. Darcy is flooded with warmth as they rise, becoming weightless, and she grabs hold of Carol’s waist and clings tightly. </p><p>The water stretches out below them, further and further away as they rise. Tendrils of golden energy whip around her, caressing her face and wrapping her in a gentle warmth that holds her close. Carol is laughing, titling her face up to meet the sun, as comfortable in the air as a bird, and yet Darcy can’t shake the feeling she’s going to fall long enough to appreciate it. It's hard not to feel like Icarus. In wanting, has she come close enough to touch the thing that will be her undoing?</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Daylight</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>200 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>They share a thousand secret touches that Darcy cannot begin to quantify. Carol’s hand brushes hers over breakfast. Her arm touches Darcy’s as she leans past her to reach her coat. Carol’s breath tangled in Darcy’s hair as they walk, side by side, under the rising sun out to the shore. Their hands meet as they push the trawler away from the dock. Feet tangle as they settle in the boat. Bodies touch as they cast the net. </p><p>They are secret, each one. And after sundown Darcy parses then in turn. Weighing each as accident or purposeful, innocent or teasing, <i>more</i> or nothing. It is accounting with no numbers, each piece of data ephemeral so it twists in her memory daring her to believe. But there is no summation that promises truth. </p><p>If she wants to know, she will have to leap. Every time she thinks about it all the promising signs, all the proof begins to shift into a tally of reasons why this is nothing Carol wants. How can Darcy bear to reach across that invisible line and find only friendship there? It makes everything she hopes feel hollow. </p><p>Instead she plans to start again tomorrow.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Grow</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>400 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The days getting longer means less working in the dark, something Darcy is eternally grateful for. It’s also the first time the frost has left the ground so she finds herself happily deep in the dirt, planting carrots side by side with Brunnhilde. </p><p>It’s hard to know what to make of the Valkyrie, who now wields a spade as efficiently as a sword. She wonders how a people who had once lived such an advanced and technological existence, and for so long, can be satisfied with carrots. But the earth seems to offer up the same comfort to them as it does her. </p><p>“Carol has been staying here a lot lately,” Brunnhilde says casually. </p><p>“Is that unusual?”</p><p>“Since you came? No. Before she used to come and go as she pleased.” </p><p>Carol, as if she’s heard her name, looks towards them and grins. She’s been shearing the sheep and is covered in little specks of off-white fluff. </p><p>Darcy busies herself with planting hoping the flush on her cheeks isn’t too obvious. </p><p>“It’s nice,” Brunnhilde adds. “I am glad to see you happy. There has been too much loss.” </p><p>“She’s a good friend,” Darcy says. </p><p>Brunnhilde outright snorts. “I’ve had a lot of friends but only one who looked at me like that.”</p><p>“She’s not –“</p><p>Brunnhilde looks amused and gestures back to Carol, who is leaning against the fence, looking straight at Darcy. She looks away as their eyes meet, turning back to the sheep. </p><p>“You were saying,” Brunnhilde says, amusedly. There is something very raw about having this secret pulled out into the open like this, both painful and thrilling – that it isn’t wholly a fantasy, but neither is it a reality. </p><p>For the first time, and foolishly so, Darcy wonders if Brunnhilde is lonely. They haven’t spoken much, but as Asgard had always seemed such a fantasy to her it seems hard to truly fathom its loss. The Asgardians hardly mention it, always moving forward and rebuilding. It’s easy to forget why they all came here. She realises, suddenly, that she is standing on a well of unspoken grief.</p><p>“It’s remarkable what you have done here,” Darcy says.</p><p>“What choice do we have but to rebuild if we are to go on?” replies Brunnhilde.</p><p>Darcy covers the seeds with the earth, pressing down on the soil with her bare hands, and quietly prays that they will grow.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. New</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>500 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Gosling is approximately the size of a loaf of bread (Darcy knows, he curls up in the breadbox often enough) and yet still somehow manages to capture a rabbit. Both Carol and Darcy wind up just standing dumbstruck, looking down at the dead <i>rabbit</i> that’s been dropped at their feet. </p><p>“Holy shit,” Darcy says. </p><p>The end result is, of course, that they hold a weird rabbit funeral. Carol manages to be both the instigator of this and manage to seem like she’s only participating begrudgingly at the same time. Darcy instead just makes sure the little rabbit is wrapped in a blanket and placed comfortably in the ground, nearly tripping over Gosling sniffing curiously around the whole time.</p><p>After it’s over, he sits triumphantly on the little grave, licking his paw ostentatiously as Darcy and Carol sit on the grass looking on. </p><p>“How’d he manage to take down something so big?” Carol asks in wonder.</p><p>“I don’t know,” Darcy says teasingly, “sometimes phenomenal cosmic power comes in tiny packages.” She gives Carol’s shoulder a gentle nudge.</p><p>Carol smiles and wraps an arm around Darcy, pulling her close. Darcy lets her head fall onto Carol’s shoulder, breathing in her scent and the warmth of her body. Carol smells faintly of ozone and the sandalwood soap they have in the house and Darcy wants nothing more than to steal all of her sweaters and bathe in it. It’s a bit ridiculous how besotted she’s become.</p><p>Carol’s fingers move in slow circles on her arm, and Darcy lets herself relax. </p><p>“He’s more like you than me,” Carol says.</p><p>“Gosling?” </p><p>“Mmm,” Carol says. “He’s just a cat, and a little one at that. He’s got tiny pitiful claws and tiny teeth. I’ve got a punch that can knock Thanos flat, but that’s not really <i>me</i>. But you? I’ve seen you working here day after day. I think if push came to shove, you’d win. Even if you only have tiny teeth and pitiful claws.” </p><p>Darcy grins. Gosling looks at them both, then turns on the spot and curls up into a little ball. </p><p>“I can’t believe you called my teeth tiny,” Darcy says after a moment.</p><p>Carol laughs. “So tiny.”</p><p>“And <i>pitiful</i> claws.” Darcy digs her nails playfully into Carol’s arm. “I’ll show you how pitiful.” </p><p>It’s play fighting, and they know it, but it’s also a tug of war. A level beyond the simple touching they’ve been doing into a game of push and pull to see who can get the closest. This is something new, and she loves it. Carol’s pulling her off balance and Darcy digs her nails in again and lets herself fall, only pretending to struggle. </p><p>They land in a heap on the ground, too entwined to be fully platonic, but neither willing to be the first to pull away. </p><p>“Told you,” Carol says at last. “Tiny.” </p><p>Darcy lets her hands fall to Carol’s waist and just pulls herself a tiny bit closer.</p>
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<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Green</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>200 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Darcy watches as one of the Aesir laughs and cups her hands around Carol’s face, letting her hands run through Carol’s hair before dropping them back to her sides. She places her hand on Carol’s bicep a moment later, and from a distance Darcy feels like it’s a possessive gesture. And Carol doesn’t move away.</p><p>She knows, deep down, that what she has with Carol is <i>something</i> and reciprocal. She knows there are looks that only Carol gives her, and that the time they’re spending together is full of something anticipatory that she wants more than anything. But Carol attracts admirers everywhere she goes, like a bright flame, and they flock to her like moths. </p><p>She’s on her feet before she realises she doesn’t actually have a reason in mind. Instead she finds herself at Carol’s side, putting herself right next to her and looking at the Aesir woman. </p><p>“Sorry,” she says after an awkward beat, turning to Carol. “I just was wondering if you were still up for potatoes and fish tonight?” </p><p>It is an unbelievably stupid and transparent excuse and she knows it, but she’s still deeply relieved when the Aesir just smiles and excuses herself.</p>
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<a name="section0014"><h2>14. Love Letters</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>200 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There’s a note left on the kitchen counter when she gets up. </p><p><i>Extra coffee keeping warm in the aga. Back in 2 days - Carol</i>. </p><p>It’s in Carol’s handwriting, and Darcy is immediately disappointed that Carol’s slipped off in the night. It was bound to happen eventually, she supposed. Still, at least Carol hadn’t left her entirely empty handed. </p><p>It’s not until she’s getting ready to go that she finds the second one, tucked into her coat pocket. </p><p><i>Don’t forget your gloves</i>. </p><p>She smiles. </p><p>There’s another one tucked between the plates in the kitchen that she finds when she’s making dinner. <i>Eggs need eating</i> which is attached to a hand-written recipe for frittata. Another in the bread box (<i>Good morning!</i>) and several tucked into the book she’s been reading that just features a lot of dry comments on parts of the text Carol obviously didn’t like. </p><p>Darcy keeps them all tucking them away in a little shoebox and wrapping them together with a bit of twine. Then she grabs a pen and some paper and writes one of her own. </p><p>
  <i>Welcome back. I missed you.</i>
</p><p>She leaves it on Carol’s pillow.</p>
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<a name="section0015"><h2>15. Touch</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>400 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There’s a cliff that Darcy retreats to when she needs somewhere to think. It reminds her very much of Poldark or something Brontë-esque, as the waves crash on the cliff base below her and the wind whips her hair back from her face. It’s still cold up here, though spring has finally, truly come, and she’s wrapped in a shawl as she looks out over the water, blasting some of her more esoteric music choices on her iPod. </p><p>A bright light blazes across the sky, and she rips her headphones out, already taking off running to meet it at the source. Carol lands not far from her, looking somewhat worse for wear with a gash across her forehead and a tear in her suit that Darcy suspects is hiding a rather nasty cut. </p><p>“Oh, god,” Darcy says, catching up to her and grabbing Carol by the shoulders before running her hands down her arms to check for injuries. “Are you OK?” she tries to examine the cut on Carol’s forehead.</p><p>Instead, Carol leans forward, pressing her forehead to Darcy’s own. She smells a little of something acid and unpleasant, and Darcy can feel Carol’s blood sticky and warm on her skin. She raises her hands up and cups the sides of Carol’s head, tangling her fingers in Carol’s limp and messy hair and gently stroking her scalp. </p><p>“It’s OK,” she says softly. “You’re home.”</p><p>Then she presses her lips to Carol’s. For a moment she’s hit with a wave of regret – this wasn’t the right time at all, and she can feel a slight shake to Carol’s body – but Carol kisses back, pulling Darcy towards her and pressing the full line of their bodies against one another. She wraps her arms around Darcy and Darcy can taste ozone, trying to pull herself ever impossibly closer. It’s not at all like she pictured it, the hundred times she’d imagined it and planned out a hundred perfect kisses. This is <i>better</i>, unplanned and somewhat artless, but even a thousand carefully laid plans would never come close to just the feeling of Carol’s hands cupping the back of her head and the taste of her lips. </p><p>Carol makes a soft sound and Darcy grips Carol’s hip hard, digging her nails into the odd fabric of her suit. </p><p>And as the sea roars beneath them, Darcy accepts she has drowned.</p>
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<a name="section0016"><h2>16. Summer</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>200 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The berries are perfectly ripe, leaving her fingers stained red as she fills a basket. The sun is beating down on them overhead and she can hear the lazy drone of insects all around. It’s almost sinful, this indulgence, of plucking fresh fruit straight from the bush. Her hands are calloused now from six months of mending fishing nets and working, but now they’re slick and sticky with juice. She can feel sweet pooling at the nape of her neck, and it gives her goosebumps when the breeze picks up, lifting her hair and making the raspberry bushes around them rustle noisily in the wind. </p><p>They’re still like that when she comes home, dropping her basket off on the table. They were meant to have pancakes, and the house smells warm and a bit like sugar, but Darcy can’t be bothered with lunch anymore. The juice gets on Carol’s face as they kiss, and Carol licks it off her fingers one at a time. Pressed up against the kitchen counter, sweltering from the heat of the aga, the sun and <i>Carol</i>, Darcy thinks this moment is just like the berries: perfectly ripe for the taking but equally ephemeral.</p>
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<a name="section0017"><h2>17. Power</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>200 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>When Darcy finds her, Carol’s leaning on New Asgard’s generator with an air of incredible nonchalance for someone glowing bright orange and levitating about an inch off the ground. Her hand is shoved deep into the machine and she’s funnelling energy into it. </p><p>“Have I ever told you you light up my life?” Darcy asks. </p><p>“Hilarious,” says Carol. </p><p>“No, really,” Darcy continues with a smirk. “You really turn me on.” </p><p>“Come over here and say that,” Carol says. She looks utterly wild, her hair standing nearly straight up on end and her eyes glowing brightly and eerily in the night. </p><p>“Not sure that’s wise while your hand is in a generator,” Darcy says mildly, leaning up against the doorframe and crossing her arms. “I’d hate to do something shocking.”</p><p>“You deserve to be shocked for these puns,” Carol replies. “Keep it up and you’re dead to me.” </p><p>“I can’t help it, you’re just so magnetic.” </p><p>“I will zap you.”</p><p>“I’ve just gotta ask: is it the power of love?” </p><p>Carol yanks her hand out and drops to the ground, stalking over to Darcy and giving her a thorough kiss in the dark as the lights across the valley wink out.</p>
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<a name="section0018"><h2>18. Joy</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>300 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s hard to begrudge mornings when they start with a sunbeam spreading across her bed, catching the curve of Carol’s waist in golden light. She feels a bit silly making high and lofty comparisons to art, but that’s how she feels looking at the soft dip of Carol’s waist and the long stretch of her legs. Her skin glows pure gold, and Darcy trails her fingers along it, imprinting the shape of Carol’s body into her mind. She wishes she could draw, and capture this warm glowing moment.</p><p>She knows they need to be up soon, but Carol has shifted, moving towards her and tucking her head into Darcy’s shoulder. She’s overwhelmed with tenderness, pressing a gentle kiss to the top of Carol’s head. </p><p>The muntins form a criss-cross pattern in the sunlight on their bed, stark against the white sheets. Darcy manages to untangle herself gently, putting the warm duvet back to keep the heat in and pads into the kitchen. She comes back with coffee and toast, finding Carol blearily sitting up, the duvet pulled high on her chest. She smiles at Darcy, and Darcy’s breath catches just for a moment. The light has lit up Carol’s golden hair, and it glows like a halo. </p><p>Carol’s hands are warm on her face as she pulls her in close, and Darcy’s breath tastes like her first sip of coffee. Carol tugs her back down into their warm little cocoon, and Darcy lets those long legs wrap around her own and finally puts her hand on the beautiful dip in Carol’s waist and <i>pulls</i>. </p><p>The coffee is cold by the time they stumble out of bed. Carol’s already late to tend to the sheep and Darcy was meant to be on a boat, but they don’t really care.</p>
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<a name="section0019"><h2>19. Late Night</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>400 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Darcy shivers, despite the warm June evening. Her legs are starting to cramp the way she’s curled herself up in the corner, but she’s wedged in a little too tightly to move and she doesn’t want to jostle Lydia too much. Lydia, is of course, a heavily pregnant ewe. It had been Carol’s idea to name them all after Pride and Prejudice characters, but it seemed fitting that Lydia was the troublesome pregnant one. </p><p>“How long does sheep labour last?” Darcy asks, sipping coffee from her thermos. Carol’s massaging Lydia gently. Gosling is too, in his own unhelpful way, and Darcy privately wonders if having a kitten standing on the shoulder of an expectant mother sheep isn’t actually the cause of the slow labour. </p><p>“Not usually this slow. At least not in my, admittedly limited, experience.” </p><p>“Should we get someone?” Darcy pats Lydia comfortingly on the head, and Lydia just lets out a particularly plaintive ‘baaaa’. “Someone who actually knows what they’re doing?”</p><p>Carol glowers. “I know what I’m doing.”</p><p>There is a long pause before Carol concedes, “Maybe – No, wait.” Carol peers more closely at a sheep’s vagina than Darcy is one hundred percent comfortable with. “That’s it,” Carol says gently. Carol reaches a gloved hand in and gives a tug, yanking a lamb out. She runs her hand over its nose and mouth and then sets it down in the warm straw. </p><p>“Would you look at that,” Darcy says quietly. </p><p>The little lamb struggles a little, writhing around before starting to get its feet under it. Gosling purrs maniacally, nuzzling up against the lamb who is still too new to do much about it. There are a couple more in quick succession, each less gross than the last as Darcy begins to admit the process is oddly fascinating. </p><p>She shakes out her numb legs, crossing the pen and flopping down next to Carol and watching the new lambs scrabble around for milk.</p><p>“I told you it was worth waiting for,” says Carol, with a soft smile. </p><p>She looks at the lambs, already standing, still a little damp and sticky in the pale white glow of the lamp and thinks it is <i> extraordinary</i>. </p><p>She feels an odd kinship with them, for she too is taking her first steps into a world she’d never known was there before. She grips Carol’s hand tightly and doesn’t let go.</p>
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<a name="section0020"><h2>20. Firelight</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>300 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The Aesir throw a midsummer festival, and it seems to involve a lot of drinking, a lot of food, and a lot of fires. Darcy’s managed to snag herself an honest-to-god flower crown to go with the long white dress Brunnhilde had gently but firmly insisted she wear. Carol looks odd in a long dress, sort of fidgety, but privately Darcy thinks it makes her look ethereal as she wanders between bonfires, the hem of her dress reflecting the light like she’s walking through the fires themselves. </p><p>Brunnhilde is dancing with a wild abandon Darcy hasn't seen in her before - her hair comes unbound falling in long black waves down her back, and Darcy watches as Brunnhilde wraps her long arms around the neck of another woman and pulls her close. </p><p>She wants to find Carol suddenly. She knows everyone is aware of them, but she’s still always been a little reticent about it in public. </p><p>Carol laughs in delight when she catches her from behind, pressing a soft kiss to her shoulder before entwining their hands. </p><p>“Well this is new,” Carol says softly. </p><p>Darcy pulls Carol down for a kiss, smiling against her mouth as Carol’s hands instinctively find her waist. </p><p>“Dance?” She asks softly. </p><p>The Aesir teach them the steps, and it’s a bit like a Ceilidh, passing partner to partner and weaving up and down the line. Darcy catches Brunnhilde’s hand, and she spins her around, pressing a gentle kiss to Darcy’s forehead as they draw close. </p><p>“You look well,” she says teasingly. </p><p>Carol catches her eye over Brunnhilde’s shoulder. </p><p>“Yeah,” says Darcy. “So do you.” </p><p>“Summer is a time of plenty,” Brunnhilde replies laughingly, passing her back to Carol who spins her around, lifting her feet clean off the ground before kissing her soundly and joyously.</p>
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<a name="section0021"><h2>21. Heat Wave</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>300 words</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This one is for amidtheflowers</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Darcy has wandered back out to the cliffs, plastering herself down onto the grass and hating the way every inch of her feels sticky. Even here, where it should be coolest next to the sea, the air is still and heavy. </p><p>The phone rings several times before Jane picks up. She sounds distracted and Darcy figures she’s either caught Jane mid-think or pre-caffeine.</p><p>“I can call back if it’s a bad time,” she says.</p><p>“No, no,” Jane says, “I’m just –“ there’s a grunt and a clang “– ha! There! Just finishing something.” </p><p>Darcy chuckles. “Still in one piece?”</p><p>“All ten fingers,” Jane confirms. “What’s up?” </p><p>“There’s something I should tell you,” Darcy says. The heat suddenly feels too much as her pulse skyrockets. She knows it’s just <i>Jane</i>, but that doesn’t stop the frantic skip of her heart. </p><p>“Sounds serious,” Jane says softly. “Are you alright?” </p><p>“Yeah,” says Darcy. “Yeah – I’m just… seeing someone?” </p><p>“Oh!” Jane perks up. “Finally! I mean – sorry, that didn’t come out right. I’m just glad. I want you settled.” </p><p>“Yeah, but it’s – It’s Carol. Captain Marvel. I told you about her?” </p><p>There is a long beat. </p><p>Then Jane says, “I knew it.” </p><p>“What?”</p><p>“Oh my god,” Jane says, laughing. “I didn’t know if I could tease you about it because you were so earnest but honestly Darcy you should hear how much you talk about her! Every time I ask you how you are you tell me what <i>Carol</i> is doing.” </p><p>“I did not –“ </p><p>“Darcy,” Jane says firmly. “You’re an idiot and I love you.” </p><p>Darcy isn’t quite sure what to say, torn between indignation and affection. In the end, it’s Jane who speaks again, “start from the beginning, I want to hear everything.” </p><p>And she does.</p>
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<a name="section0022"><h2>22. Summer Love</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>200 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>In her defence, she doesn’t do it on purpose. But it’s early and the sun is only just peeking over the horizon when Carol gets a message saying she’s needed right now and before Darcy’s brain has even kicked into gear Carol’s already pulling on her suit and heading out the door. </p><p>Darcy stumbles after, leaning in the doorframe as Carol gives her a quick goodbye kiss. Darcy can feel her fingers pressed against her scalp and rubs her thumbs in soothing circles on Carol’s cheeks. </p><p>“I’ll be back soon,” Carol says softly, turning to go. She’s just about to take off when Darcy replies without thinking, “love you.” </p><p>Carol trips, stumbles and turns around looking wide-eyed at Darcy who has only just realised what she’s said. </p><p>Carol gives her an odd sort of half-smile, looking a bit shellshocked. She runs back, pressing another kiss to Darcy’s lips. </p><p>“Love you too,” she says. </p><p>Darcy feels Carol’s power rise up around her, crackling sharply in the air around them, prickling at her face with the gentle tingle of electricity. Carol rises straight up, her fingers staying on Darcy’s face until the last moment, before she shoots up into the bright sky.</p>
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<a name="section0023"><h2>23. Autumn</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>400 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The Aesir, it seems, do celebrate thanksgiving. Or, at least, they celebrate a harvest festival which involves eating a load of food (including a turkey). It is, by far, Darcy’s favourite festival of the year. She and Carol wander home, both stuffed and rather drunk on mead. Carol’s arm is heavy, slung over her shoulder, and Darcy presses her hip up against Carol as they walk so they sort of half-stumble as they go. Carol keeps pressing gentle kisses to Darcy’s temple as they go.</p><p>They make it in the door, and Carol’s hands are already all over her. It’s not until they make it to the bed that Darcy realises they have a problem. The zipper on Carol’s jacket is stuck, and she’s tugging at it sort of futilely, unwilling to actually break the kiss long enough to take a look. Carol starts giggling, taking over from Carol and <i>tugging</i>.</p><p>The zipper snaps off with an emphatic crack. </p><p>“Shit,” Darcy says, laughing. She yanks down on the broken zipper and it doesn’t budge in the slightest. “Oh god you’re trapped.”</p><p>Carol is too busy pressing gentle kisses to the exposed skin below Darcy’s ear to respond.</p><p>“No really,” says Darcy, a sense of mild panic arising amidst the general pleasant bubbliness of being absolutely drunk. “Your tits are trapped. Forever. Locked away. I’ll never touch them again.”</p><p>Carol rolls her eyes and grabs Darcy’s hand and presses it to her boob.</p><p>“Ah, yes, I was really hoping to spend the evening groping you through an enormous jacket. I’m really looking forward to the sex we’re gonna have while you’re naked from the waist down and still wearing an ugly parka. This has been a secret fantasy of mine for ages.” </p><p>Carol pulls back, looks down at her jacket, then back up at Darcy. Then, grinning, she does an odd shimmy, squirming out of the jacket by pulling the whole thing over her head and taking her shirt off for good measure in the process.</p><p>“Ta da!” Carol says, throwing the parka at the wall where it slowly slides down into an ugly orange heap on the floor, one jacket arm still raised in a dramatic death pose. </p><p>She looks so proud when she’s finished, with her hair standing up on end, that Darcy can’t help but press her down to the bed and shower her in kisses.</p>
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<a name="section0024"><h2>24. Knitwear</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>200 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Darcy is tucked up in the blankets, her stockinged feet folded underneath her and Carol resting her head on her knees. Her mug of spiced tea is warm in one hand and her book is in the other, but she’s struck suddenly by the sight of Carol lounging so casually against her and just how <i>right</i> it all feels. She isn’t sure when it shifted, but she realises her life is now a world built with space for Carol in it. Her days are complete when Carol is there, her default is to make coffee for two, her bed feels empty without her. </p><p>It’s a shift that has snuck up on her so gradually she hasn’t really noticed. She has become half of a whole, and she feels much richer for it. </p><p>Overwhelmed with sudden affection, Darcy puts her book down and runs her fingers through Carol’s hair. While Carol leans back and presses her head into Darcy’s legs, humming with pleasure, Darcy tries to take stock of this moment and the warmth she feels here, to embed it into her memory and keep hold of it forever.</p><p>She wants a thousand more days, just like this one.</p>
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<a name="section0025"><h2>25. Coffee</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>200 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s the first chill of autumn and Darcy can feel it. Her nose (very nearly the only bit of her sticking out from under the covers) is freezing. She hunkers down, curling up into a little ball. Gosling has wormed his way under the covers too and has curled up against her belly, his soft head resting on her arm. </p><p>Carol’s hand runs through Darcy’s hair, and she feels Carol press a kiss to her shoulder through the duvet, and then she smells it: coffee. </p><p>“Flurgh?” Is what she actually says, but Carol seems to understand. </p><p>“Yeah, there’s coffee,” she replies affectionately. “I’m gonna wake the sheep up and take them up the hill. You can probably get away with another twenty minutes.” </p><p>The coffee smells utterly decadent, bitter and deep, and it fills the room with an artificial sense of warmth. Darcy stretches a hand out far enough to grab the coffee and drag it into the duvet tent she’s made for herself. </p><p>Carol lifts the corner and Darcy shouts, “no! Don’t let the heat out.” </p><p>Sarcastically, Carol puts the duvet back down and kisses the top of Darcy’s blanket covered head. “I love you, you absolute beautiful idiot.”</p>
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<a name="section0026"><h2>26. Leaves</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>400 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There’s a decided crunch of leaves underfoot as she walks now, and somehow this makes up for the fact that the temperature has dropped back down to near-freezing. She can see her own breath in the air as she walks, and she’s grateful for the hat she has pulled down over her ears. </p><p>She leans on the fence, resting her forearms on the weathered wood and watches Carol shepherding the sheep back in for the evening. It’s odd to see someone so powerful doing something mundane, and she wonders sometimes if Carol ever senses the disparity between them. She is, after all, very little compared to Carol, who can strike down whole fleets empty handed, and whose travels have taken her out further than she could ever hope to go. What does she have to offer in comparison, Darcy often wonders. </p><p>It feels a bit like standing on the blade of a knife. That she and Carol live in this little perfect bubble they’ve built for themselves, and that some day when she loses balance it will burst. It’s hard not to feel that day is coming closer as summer has come to an end. After all, at some point Carol is bound to want to move on. </p><p>She’s quiet as they walk back, oblivious to the way Carol has so effortlessly taken her hand as they walk. Carol softly tells her about her day, and about how the harvest is going, but it isn’t until they’ve made it inside that she brushes Darcy’s hair back from her face and says, “you’re awfully quiet.”</p><p>Darcy shrugs. “Just thinking about the end of summer.” </p><p>“Oh?” Carol grins, hanging their coats up and heading into the kitchen. “Fishing less fun now that it’s cold again?”</p><p>“Something like that,” Darcy says. </p><p>Carol wraps her arms around Darcy from behind and rests her chin on Darcy’s shoulder. “What, then?”</p><p>“I just hate the dark,” says Darcy. “And the way everything is dying.” </p><p>“They’ll be back,” says Carol softly. “It’s just winter coming. Spring will be back before we know it.” </p><p>She bends down and pulls their big soup pot out of a cupboard and sets it down with a clack. </p><p>“Next year we should see if we can get some goats.” </p><p><i>Next year</i>. Later, when Carol is asleep, Darcy makes a quiet wish that there’ll be a lifetime of years after that.</p>
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<a name="section0027"><h2>27. Twilight</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>300 words</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Jane pulls up in an enormous truck that makes her look even shorter than she actually is. Then she shrieks and pulls Darcy into an enormous hug. She gives Carol an impromptu hug as well and then immediately starts pulling lab equipment out of the bed of the truck.</p><p>“There’s barely any light pollution here,” she says, huffling a little. “I’m mostly here for the observatory, but I thought it might be nice to have a quick look tonight.” </p><p>“Or we could sleep,” Darcy says hopefully, but Jane pointedly ignores her. </p><p>In the end it’s rather like old times, with them clustered around a small campfire and Jane quietly peering through her telescope while wrapped in her ratty old plaid fleece blanket. Darcy has an obligatory look at the planets and Andromeda – it’s not really begrudging, there will probably never come a point where Jane’s whole-hearted awe of the universe doesn’t inspire some wonder in her – before passing the telescope off to Carol for her to look. </p><p>“So which ones have you been to?” she asks. </p><p>Jane <i>perceptibly</i> sits up. </p><p>Carol just laughs, angling the telescope and pointing so they can all see at various stars, describing the worlds that orbit them and the places she’s seen. She talks about a planet that was nearly all water and got so cold that half the globe froze over in the winter and the inhabitants migrated to a different continent on foot over the ice, about another world that had sentient trees that formed a hive mind across its surface, and another that had enormous methane lakes.</p><p>“Which is your favourite?” Jane asks, earnestly. “The most incredible place you’ve been?”</p><p>“Earth,” says Carol. “Everything I’ve ever truly loved is here. No amount of splendour could ever replace that.”</p>
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<a name="section0028"><h2>28. Slumber</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>300 words.<br/>So sorry for the delay!</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Darcy’s tongue is rhythmically stroking Carol’s clit when Gosling decides to jump up on the bed and loudly announce his presence with a meow. Carol immediately collapses into giggles as Darcy rests her forehead against Carol’s thigh and bites down on the furious urge to scream. Gosling simply purrs and headbutts her gently, rubbing along the side of her cheek. </p><p>“Not now,” Darcy says, picking Gosling up and cradling him in her arms. She presses a kiss to his head. “I love you very much,” she says, then throws him out of the room and slams the door. </p><p>Carol is grinning at her with barely suppressed laughter. Darcy leans down and kisses her soundly and Carol’s peak of laughter is cut off by Darcy’s mouth. </p><p>She’s really enjoying the kiss when she hears the meow. It’s plaintive, long, and <i>loud</i> and accompanied by a great deal of scratching at the door. Gosling is nearing out a frantic tattoo of scratches and caterwauling as loud as his little heart can manage. </p><p>“Oh, we’re horrible people,” says Carol.</p><p>“Horrible people get laid,” Darcy points out. </p><p>Carol sniggers as Darcy flops face-first onto the bed. “We’re horrible people.” </p><p>Gosling meows in furious agreement. </p><p>Darcy caves first, letting him in and looking guilty the whole time. It’s hard not to find Gosling’s expression smug as he turns on the spot and settles down in between them, purring contentedly. He stretches out his paw, resting it on Darcy’s shoulder and wiggles a little, getting comfortable.</p><p>“Sleep?” Darcy says with a sigh. </p><p>Carol kisses her over Gosling’s head. “Think of all the karma we’ve just gained.” </p><p>Privately, Darcy isn’t sure it’s worth it. But Gosling is like a little hot water bottle and Carol’s hand is in hers as she drifts off to sleep.</p>
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<a name="section0029"><h2>29. End</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>300 words.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“You know,” says Carol casually, as they’re walking hand in hand towards the cliffs. “It's been nearly a year since we met.”</p><p>Darcy nudges her with her shoulder. “It’s been a good year.” </p><p>“It really has,” says Carol, pressing a kiss to the top of Darcy’s head. “Here’s to another.”</p><p>Darcy squeezes their fingers together. “Do you ever think about leaving?” she asks. “Or like, going back to being an actual superhero.” </p><p>Carol sighs. “Not really – or at least, not anymore. I mean, I still go if I’m needed, but I don’t think I’m done here. I came here looking to find peace, or something like it, and I <i>have</i>. If you’d told me a year ago that I was going to enjoy shepherding and eating nothing but root vegetables I’d have thought you were insane, but now?” </p><p>She stops, turning to Darcy. “Now I look forward to it. I look forward to waking up next to you every day. I look forward to coming home to you every day. I like eating food that we’ve grown ourselves. I love knowing that we’re doing something productive. And I love you – I love everything that I’ve learned from you, everything we share. I can’t imagine being anywhere else.” </p><p>It’s not at all the answer Darcy was expecting and she’s a little bit floored, though she feels it utterly and viscerally in turn. She tries at first to answer, but is caught wordless. </p><p>In the end she gives up and pulls Carol into the most effusive kiss she can manage, pouring all her love, all her emotion into it and tangling her hands in Carol’s hair. Carol laughs into the kiss in delight. They part, panting slightly, foreheads pressed together and grinning madly.</p><p>“To another year,” Darcy says.</p>
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